On the passing of Nathan H.

This is the second memorial in 2 months I’ve attended due to drug overdose. I was asked to speak (as Pastor) at Nathan’s memorial. In my anger and grief, I prayerfully asked to be guided in what message I should convey. This is the message that the Holy Spirit guided me to write for those gathered, and feel it applies to many, too many, of us who live with those who use drugs and live lives without hope.

Grace and Peace to you all in the name of God our Creator, as we gather to mourn and remember our brother Nate.

I’ve been asked to speak today, and I acknowledge that there is a diverse group of folks here and I humbly ask that we support and respect each other’s grieving with loving kindness and forbearance.

Our lives these days have never been so challenged, even at times precarious and vulnerable.  Nate’s passing feels unbearable, subsuming what stability we strive for to maintain our lives.  He is a sudden and fierce loss to us all.  Yet in this violent end there is a precious rare and costly opportunity to clearly see what is immutable, unchanging, and transcendent of the suffering in this world.  We can hear our Creator saying difficult, challenging, and profoundly important words: He has had enough of our subservience to the corrupted and self-serving ways of the world; love and truth must reign; and it is up to us to manifest it.

Nathan’s life encompassed tragedy and beauty, incredible courage and heartbreak, success and failure, ecstasy and misery in which we all have shared with him, and we are all profoundly impacted both by his life and his death.  Now our world must necessarily be broken down so that we can rebuild to continue on without him. Still, in our shock and grief his passing has a message so that we may carry on, one that we must allow to envelop our hearts along with our pain: To allow ourselves and others to suffer and struggle alone and in silence is not acceptable.  We must do more to help each other.  We need to ask for more from each other.  The tenuous world around us shows no mercy, and is bound to ensnare us.  To survive and thrive we must put down the ways that do not build us up, and keep a sober watch to the realities around us.  Death calls to us to be better in life; it calls us to be warriors of love, light, and truth, in all things and in all ways because these are the only things that matter and endure.  God our Father has shown us through His Son Jesus Christ that mercy, forgiveness, and salvation is available to all, not through any worldly and transitory pursuit or authority, but only through the acceptance of God’s eternal gift of love and then by being the embodiment of His love to each other through sacrifice and service. This is our life’s true purpose: to love one another, to serve each other in love, to forgive as we’ve been forgiven, and to dedicate ourselves to embodying love and truth even when it is difficult, resisted, reviled, and persecuted.

1 John 4:12 says, “No one has seen God at any time. If we love one another, God abides in us, and His love has been perfected in us. “

Micah 6:8 says “He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?”

As time will pass, the clarity in this moment will fade, but its unlimited divine importance and our integrity in pursuing it, will never be more important and more tested by the world.  Let Nate’s death change you and your life; let his life and struggle be the catalyst in your life to do what must be done, putting down your pride and picking up the cross of being a better person through the crucified and resurrected Christ, a sacrifice made for us by God’s love.  The necessity of being warriors in God’s love will never decrease but always face new demands.  Write this truth on your heart; live it in all your ways.  And let us remember and honor Nathan by being victorious through God, His Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Our Father who is in heaven, hallowed be your name.  May your kingdom come, may your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.  Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us.  Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.  We pray in your name Lord.  Amen. 

May Grace and Mercy pursue you all of your days.